Cellular One, Lake Havasu City, AZ - fell behind on making monthly payments - trouble getting $ 200 deposit back as result

# 6 for July 15, 2003

Complaints.com received the following on July 14, 2003:

From:

RE: Cellular One, Lake Havasu City, AZ - fell behind on making monthly payments - trouble getting $ 200 deposit back as result

After a year of paying too much and receiving poor service from Cellular One, I fell back a month on my payment. I began to receive numerous calls from Cell One, threatening to take me to collections. I asked one caller, Jason, why I was being harassed when they still had my deposit of $200.00, then I realized that I should've received that deposit after my one year contract was up.

Jason told me that in fact, I could've received it after six months! So I told him he needs to send me my money if he wants another payment from me. Jason told me that I now had to wait ANOTHER six months before I could receive my deposit, since I was no longer in good standing with the company. I told Jason that not only was I not in 'good standing' with the company, but as of that moment, I was no longer a customer and I wanted my deposit back immediately. That was in December.

Since then I've received a dozen or more calls a month, they refused to refund my deposit, yet they credited my account (which I had already cancelled) with the amount of the deposit, reinstated the account, and began feeding off of it until it was dry. Then, more calls demanding more money. I received an e-mail from a Jackie Battle in their customer service department who said she wanted to help resolve the situation. I told her the only thing she had to do to accomplish this was to return the money they've stolen from me.

She told me I had to first make a 'request' to have my phone shut off and then I would have to wait another month. I told her I had demanded the phone to be shut off already and was not about to get sucked into being responsible for a bill I was certainly going to receive if I 'requested' my service cut off now. She became irrate, told me that she refused to help me and to never contact her again.

That was two months ago. Since then, I have received more threatening phone calls and will most likely never see my deposit. Before I become violent, I would like to seek help just one more time. Can you help?

J.D. Bristow

Lake Havasu City, Arizona

86403